National Youth Administration Carpentry: 4 million pieces of furniture made or repaired, 52 million board feet of lumber produced, 324 thousand cords of firewood cut

Above: National Youth Administration (NYA) workers on a carpentry project in Washington, D.C., ca. 1935-1943. NYA workers made or repaired over 4 million pieces of furniture for schools and other public buildings. They also produced 52 million board feet of lumber, cut 324 cords of firewood, and manufactured playground equipment, park benches, picnic tables, checkerboards, ping pong tables, desks, dressers, window frames, looms, and more. When America became more involved in World War II, young adults in NYA woodworking shops created "work benches, target frames, ammunition shipping cases, machine gun boxes, ammunition boxes, footlockers, and hospital chests" (Federal Security Agency, War Manpower Commission, Final Report of the National Youth Administration, Fiscal Years 1936-1943, 1944, pp. 153-154). Photo courtesy of the National Archives.

New Deal Art: "Sandy Acre"

Above: "Sandy Acre," a watercolor artwork by Amy Jones (1899-1992), created while she was in the New Deal's Section of Fine Arts, 1938. Jones was a very successful artist and painted murals for at least three post offices: Winstead, Connecticut; Painted Post, New York; and Scotia, New York. Image courtesy of the Smithsonian American Art Museum.

The National Youth Administration: 130,000 cars, trucks, and tractors repaired

Above: A city mechanic (standing on the vehicle's running board) helps train James DeSoto, an enrollee in the New Deal's National Youth Administration (NYA), Fresno, California, 1940. Among their many achievements, young Americans employed in the NYA repaired over 130,000 cars, trucks, and tractors (Federal Security Agency, War Manpower Commission, Final Report of the National Youth Administration, Fiscal Years 1936-1943, 1944, p. 157). Workers like DeSoto learned every aspect of car repair, including "removal and installation of motors... bearings and cylinder work... piston rings... front and rear axle... transmission... electrical system... brakes... frame and fender repair..." (Final Report, p. 161). Along the way these young adults earned modest paychecks, which they needed immediately, and also acquired skills they could use for the rest of their lives. Photo courtesy of the National Archives.

New Deal Celestial Art (5/5): "The Comet" and "The Big Dipper"

Above: "The Comet," a linoleum artwork by Edward Hagedorn (1902-1982), created while he was in the WPA, ca. 1935-1943. Hagedorn was a lifelong San Francisco Bay Area resident. A colleague once said: "Ed was an outsider, a loner, a tall thin man who walked down the street looking like a question-mark; he had no use for success." And it's been noted that "after much early success the eccentric and idealistic Hagedorn, troubled by personal shyness, ceased to exhibit his work publicly in the late 1930s." Image courtesy of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco.

Above: "The Big Dipper," another linoleum WPA artwork by Edward Hagedorn. In addition to artworks like "The Comet" and "The Big Dipper," many of Hagedorn's pieces depict war, and also large skeletal or menacing creatures crushing smaller people. Though Hagedorn may not have intended it, I find them to be fantastic representations of American plutocracy and American-style capitalism (i.e., financial bullying and brutality). It's been suggested that "The spirit went out of much of his work from about 1940, and although Hagedorn continued to make art throughout most of his life, it often devolved into trivializing depictions of the female nude." That might be an oversimplification; but even if just partly true, that's a shame, because he clearly had something to say in his early works. Image courtesy of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco.

New Deal Celestial Art (4/5): The lunar and solar art of George Harding

The following three artworks are located in the U.S. Custom House in Philadelphia. They were painted by George Harding (1883-1959), while he was in the New Deal's Section of Fine Arts, 1938. The images are courtesy of the General Services Administration and Carol M. Highsmith.

 Above: "Phases of the Moon"

Above: "Phases of the Sun"

Above: "Solar Eclipse"

These are just 3 of the 31 paintings that Harding made for the U.S. Custom House. He was paid $12,766 by the Section of Fine Arts - probably somewhere in the neighborhood $200,000 today (Final Report, Section of Fine Arts, p. 25). This amount paid from the public coffers, to decorate a building, might surprise many; but it must be remembered that art and the common good were much more valued during the New Deal than they are today. 

In modern times, we've been trained, like seals flapping our flippers for Lonesome Rhodes, to believe that if something isn't good for millionaires & billionaires then it isn't good at all, and so, not worth doing. This is why so much public and quasi-public architecture is so bland and dreary today - public schools that look like penitentiaries; bridges that look like regular roadway (e.g., no arches, trusses, sidewall designs, or statues); art-free post offices; courthouses with no sculptures; featureless and seemingly prefabricated state park buildings (as opposed to the older CCC-built log cabins & pavilions); and so on. Inspiring art and creative architecture is being eradicated, in order to protect (and secure more) tax breaks for the rich. On the other hand, many millions of Americans have no problem opening up the public purse for a new billion-dollar sports stadium. Why? Because it's good for the millionaire players and the billionaire owners.

Instead of flapping our flippers for the super-wealthy, how about if we invest more in the arts and the common good?

Above: The bold and triumphant architecture of the U.S. Custom House in Philadelphia. This is how they did it back then. According to Professor of History Charlene Mires, the New Deal's Public Works Administration (PWA) contributed $4 million towards its construction - about $77 million in today's dollars (Independence Hall in American Memory, University of Pennsylvania Press, 2013, p. 187). Photo courtesy of Carol M. Highsmith.

New Deal Celestial Art (3/5): "The Drama of the Heavens" and "Gazing at the Stars"

Above: "The Drama of the Heavens," a WPA poster created in 1939. There was a planetarium construction craze in the United States during the 1930s and the Adler Planetarium was the first, opening in 1930. A 1937 newspaper article about a planned planetarium in Pittsburgh (the Buhl Planetarium) noted that "The Adler Planetarium in Chicago, first to be constructed in this country, has attracted millions... eager to see how the heavens looked when the Christ child was born and how it will look in the year 2036" ("Big Planetarium In Pittsburgh To Excel All In U.S.," The Courier (Waterloo, Iowa), May 11, 1937). I remember going on an elementary school field trip to the Maryland Science Center, and seeing a show in the Davis Planetarium. Millions of Americans across the U.S. probably have similar fond memories. Image courtesy of the Library of Congress.

Above: "Gazing at the Stars," an etching by William Sanger (1873-1961), created while he was in the WPA's Federal Art Project, ca. 1935-1938. Americans looked to the stars more and more in the 1920s and 30s. According to several Wikipedia entries, science fiction began gaining real popularity in the 1920s, and the "Golden Age of Science Fiction" began around 1938. Characters like Flash Gordon and Buck Rogers became well-known through comic strips and films of the day. Science fiction, planetariums, star-watching, and the possibility of space travel really captured the public's imagination. Image courtesy of the General Services Administration and the Baltimore Museum of Art.

New Deal Celestial Art (2/5): "Constellation"

Above: "Constellation," an artwork by Georg Redlich (1918 or 1919, to 1941), created while he was in the WPA, ca. 1935-1941. "Constellation" is described as a "Brush and black wash on buff wove paper." There is little or no information about Redlich on the Internet, but it seems he died in a car accident, at age 22, just as his career was beginning to flourish ("Georg F. Redlich, Young Artist, Is Killed In Wreck," Chicago Tribune, December 22, 1941). The article reported that his "paintings hang in the Art Institute [of Chicago] and several other Chicago galleries." An earlier article noted that he was a "young scholarship student at the Art Institute" (Chicago Tribune, March 10, 1940). Image courtesy of the Art Institute of Chicago.

New Deal Celestial Art (1/5): "Meteor Falling to Earth" and "Zodical Light"

Above: "Meteor Falling to Earth," an oil painting by Chris Olson (1905-2000), created while he was in the WPA art program, 1940. In addition to being an artist, Olson became a strawberry farmer in Wisconsin and "supplied strawberries to many of the [Oshkosh] area grocery stores. His interest in strawberries led him to develop a new variety of everbearing strawberries. In 1975 his family successfully applied for a patent for the new variety" ("Christian Olson," The Oshkosh Northwestern, August 15, 2000). Image courtesy of the General Services Administration and the Oshkosh Public Museum.

Above: "Zodical Light," another oil painting Chris Olson made while he was in the WPA. Zodical, or "zodiacal," light is "A faint elongated cone of light sometimes seen in the night sky, extending from the horizon along the ecliptic. It is thought to be due to the reflection of sunlight from particles of ice and dust within the plane of the solar system" (Oxford Dictionary). Image courtesy of the General Services Administration and the Oshkosh Public Museum.